The Consciousness Atlas is an interactive web app that visualizes more
than 450 theories of consciousness. It is based on Robert Lawrence
Kuhn's 2024 paper,
"A Landscape of Consciousness". The Atlas maps theories that address phenomenal consciousness - the
subjective feel of experience, such as the redness of red.
What the Atlas is
The Atlas is a visual reference built on Kuhn's taxonomy. It presents
the full set of theories at once so you can explore the field visually
and open any theory to read its entry, like an encyclopedia with
structured entries. Each theory entry shows a concise identity line,
conceptual ground, suggested mechanism, empirical notes, implications,
and sources.
Why this exists
Consciousness is studied across disciplines - neuroscience,
philosophy, and sometimes spiritual or anomalous-state research.
Kuhn's paper collects and organizes hundreds of theories along a
spectrum from most physical to least physical. The Atlas puts that
organization into a visual form so readers, students, and researchers
can quickly see how different positions relate and where each theory
sits on the spectrum.
How it works
Theories are grouped into ten main categories, arranged by their
stance on the physical-to-nonphysical spectrum. Examples of categories
include Materialism, Non-Reductive Physicalism, Functionalism,
Quantum-based theories, Panpsychism, Monism, Dualism, Idealism,
Anomalous States, and Challenge Theories. The app shows the whole map
at once. Click any theory to read its structured entry, which includes
references to canonical sources and named thinkers.
Who it is for
- Students learning philosophy of mind and cognitive science
-
Researchers and lecturers looking for an at-a-glance comparative
resource
-
Journalists and writers who need a quick reference to the range of
positions
-
Curious readers who want a clear view of what people mean when they
talk about consciousness
What the Atlas does not do
The Atlas does not endorse or rank theories. It is a visualization and
reference based on Kuhn's taxonomy - collect and present, not judge.
It does not attempt to settle the hard problem of consciousness. It is
a tool for exploration and comparison.
A note from Kuhn
Kuhn explicitly states the project's purpose: "collect and categorize,
not assess and adjudicate." The Consciousness Atlas follows that
approach. The data and structure are derived from Kuhn's paper;
feedback and suggested corrections are welcome, but the app is a
visualization layer on top of Kuhn's work.
Kuhn was not involved in the design or content of the Consciousness
Atlas, other than his original paper, 'A Landscape of Consciousness,'
which is the sole source.
FAQ
What is phenomenal consciousness?
Phenomenal consciousness refers to subjective experience - the
qualitative feel of being aware, like the taste of coffee or the
redness of red.
How many theories does the Atlas include?
The Atlas visualizes over 220 individual theories, grouped into ten
broad categories.
Does the Atlas show which theory is true?
No. The Atlas presents theories neutrally. It is a map, not an
argument for any single position.
Is the Atlas academic?
The Atlas is based on an academic source - Robert Kuhn's 2024 paper,
"A Landscape of Consciousness" - and links to canonical sources
where available.
Summary
The Consciousness Atlas is a straightforward visualization tool: it
presents Kuhn's taxonomy as a single, explorable map and lets users
open individual theory entries to read structured, referenced
summaries. It is designed to make this complex field easier to survey
and to serve as a practical reference.
Dualism
Pitts’s Interactionist Dualism: Energy Conservation and Mental Causation
Mental Causation Without Fear of Conservation Laws
J. Brian Pitts argues that the old objection to interactionist dualism, that a mind acting on the brain would violate conservation of energy and momentum, is circular. Conservation laws hold place by place and follow from symmetries, so a soul acting in a particular brain at a particular time would break those symmetries locally, and local non-conservation is what dualism predicts rather than a refutation of it. He adds that General Relativity raises a newer difficulty, whose force depends on one’s wider worldview.
J. Brian Pitts
What consciousness is
Pitts does not offer a positive account of what consciousness is. He defends the coherence of a non-physical mind or soul that acts causally on the brain.
Mind and body
Two-way interaction: the mind or soul acts in the brain during a person’s lifetime, for example when one wills to raise an arm. Pitts frames the argument for substance dualism but notes it also applies to property dualism with distinctively mental causal powers.
Mechanism
Noether’s theorem and its converse: conservation laws follow from the uniformity of laws over time and space, and symmetry violation implies conservation violation. A soul acting here and now breaks time and space uniformity, so local non-conservation in brains is an expected consequence of interactionism.
Core claims
- Conservation laws are primarily local partial differential equations, an infinite conjunction of conservations at every place, so a failure in brains need not threaten physics elsewhere.
- Global conservation requires discarding a term at spatial infinity, which standard cosmology arguably does not permit, so the universe’s total mass-energy may be undefined.
- Demanding that conservation hold in the brain without neuroscientific evidence begs the question against interactionism.
- Proposals for non-local compensation make matters worse by adding a second violation, and quantum mechanics is unnecessary because the objection already fails in classical field theory.
- General Relativity makes interactionist causation harder, since it tends to leave the soul doing nothing or the same thing everywhere and always.
Criticisms
Pitts himself raises the strongest tension: under General Relativity, generalized Bianchi identities tend to trivialize added mental causation. He judges this objection weak for theists and mind-first metaphysicians but a real problem for non-theist dualists such as Popper or Beloff.
Implications
- Survival beyond death: Possible
- A mind distinct from the brain could in principle outlast it, though Pitts’s argument concerns physics and makes no claim about an afterlife.
- Virtual immortality: Unlikely
- Since mental causation here comes from a non-physical mind acting in the brain, copying the brain’s physical pattern would not carry that mind along.
Related theories
Sources
- Pitts’s Interactionist Dualism: Energy Conservation and Mental Causation (Landscape of Consciousness entry), J. Brian Pitts
Explore all theories on the Consciousness Atlas
